Wessex Water is nearing completion of a new 6.5km underground pipeline to connect Bristol’s existing trunk sewer in Lawrence Weston to the Frome Valley relief sewer near Cribbs Causeway.

Construction work on the mammoth £55 million project, which will direct waste more efficiently around North Bristol to the water company’s water recycling centre in Avonmouth, began in summer 2019 and is planned to finish by spring 2023.

The majority of the new “super sewer” has been constructed using a specialist tunnel boring machine which has travelled underground for 19 months – the route included tunnelling underneath the M5 motorway and Network Rail’s Henbury Loop freight railway.

The tunnelling machine has now reached the end of its journey and arrived at the Bristol Golf Club, where it will be taken out of the ground in a site compound on the golf course. Wessex Water will be constructing a chamber which connects the existing sewer pipe underneath the golf course to the new relief sewer.

The utility has been working with J. Murphy & Sons Ltd, principal contractors to construct the tunnel and lay the pipework. The next stage is to fit out the tunnel with mechanical and electrical equipment.

The North Bristol relief sewer is one of the largest sewerage projects Wessex Water has ever undertaken which will support the city’s growth for years to come. The sewer forms an essential part of the company’s long-term sewerage strategy for the next 100 years.